Zahlavova Strycova beats Wozniacki to reach Wimbledon QFs

Yaroslava Shvedova, the 65th ranked Kazakh, is into the last 16 at Wimbledon, to match her performance in 2012 when she reached the same stage. She was playing 30th ranked Madison Keys on Saturday evening, but the match was suspended by bad light. She had led by a breaker (9-7) and got to 6-6 before going off court to return on Monday, only to find that her opponent was injured and could not resume the match.

The 43rd ranked Czech, Barbora Zahlavova Strycova, is having a great run on the grass. She easily beat a qualifier in the first round, followed by another easy victory over 32nd seeded Elena Vesnina before coming through two breakers to oust 2nd seeded Na Li in the third round. On Monday afternoon before rain stopped play, she completed yet another fine victory – this time against 16th seeded Caroline Wozniacki for her first ever last 16 at Wimbledon. She took the first set easily 6-2 in 35 minutes, but really had to battle against the never-give-up Dane before taking the 2nd set 7-5 on her 6th match point in exactly an hour.

Another Czech to complete her match before the rain was 23rd seeded Lucie Safarova. She won against the dangerous Julia Goerges in two breakers in the first round, beat Polona Hercog in straights in the 2nd round, took out 10th seeded Dominika Cibulkova in the third also in straights, before taking on yet another Czech, the 175th ranked qualifier Tereza Smitkova. The unknown Czech won her first two matches in straights – against Su-Wei Hsieh and Coco Vandeweghe – before toughing it out against Bojana Jovanovski in three sets before facing Safarova. The higher ranked Czech put an end to Smitkova’s run with a decisive 6-2 6-0 in just 48 minutes on court.

The last 3rd round match to be completed after play was stopped on Saturday evening was that between 19th seeded Sabine Lisicki and 11th seeded Ana Ivanovic. The German had taken the first set 6-4 and it was 1-1 on serve before bad light stopped play on Saturday. The Serb fought back to 5-2 on Monday afternoon before this time rain stopped play. She went on to take the set 6-3, but Lisicki allowed her only one game in finishing off the decider 6-1.

You Love Tennis Right...

Join the Stevegtennis.com tennis club for free. Just enter your email below for...